Abstract
HiDubai is a consumer-tech initiative by Dubai Economy Government. The business discovery platform was conceived with the aim of revolutionizing the interaction between businesses and customers in the U.A.E through an digital means.
HiDubai wanted to develop a web-based platform where you would find all the marketing services it provides. Thus, we began designing the website from scratch, focusing on maintaining a consistent user experience through the website while providing a medium to showcase the services to the target audience in a clear and concise format.
Worked as the sole designer in a multidisciplinary team including software development team and project manager
- Adobe Illustrator
- Adobe Photoshop
- Figma
- Miro
3 months
My Role
I was the only designer working on this project, so I worked closely and collaborated with the front-end development team, project manager, business development team as well as the head of operations in order to come up with a coherent template for the content design and information architecture.
Problem Statement
HiDubai lacked a platform for information on what marketing services it provided. The goal of this project was to design and create a website that is accessible for business owners to browse and purchase the services. Thus HiDubai Reach was born!
Building out HiDubai Reach
Research
Understanding the audience for HiDubai Reach
After meeting with the head of operations and project manager, we concluded that our target audience would be business owners looking to market their products using economical but effective all-inclusive digital marketing services. In order to get started with the design, I decided to conduct interviews with our users to get qualitative insights into the expectations from our platform. I used one-on-one generative research interviews. This methodology would allow us to dig deeper into our customers’ thought processes, fostering a strong sense of empathy and enabling us to meet our objectives. The research questions asked were
Business owners looking for something that helps promote their businesses and have a good experience using HiDubai overall
After analyzing the data from the interviews I conducted (3 user interviews), I created a customer user journey.
To validate the qualitative insights, we designed and rolled out a survey to get replies from 250+ users.
Aligning HiDubai goals with user needs
Comparative Analysis
It was time for me to do some competitive analysis to compare and contrast. I focused on three factors that could affect the experience adversely, that is Navigation, Content Organization, and Visual Hierarchy. I conducted a competitive analysis of the three most popular marketing websites within that space to see what was working or what could be improved and how I can reflect that within my own design.
Navigation
Content Organization
Visual Hierarchy
No consistent space between different headings and content
Design
Building out the structure for HiDubai Reach
Based on the user’s needs and after analyzing user pain points and opportunities, I created the information architecture for the HiDubai Reach website. This was done after multiple brainstorming sessions with the development team, project manager, and head of operations. We conducted an impact-effort matrix in order to decide which content should come first. This allowed us to build an effective information architecture for the website.
We further validated the sitemap through usability testing through the medium-fidelity prototype. Key insights we learned through the testing is that users always prioritize or look for the marketing services first and then inquire more about the company and services. We worked on the high-fidelity prototype keeping this in mind.
Two major improvements in the design
In the book, ‘Don’t Make Me Think’, Krug says, counting the number of clicks is a good metric but what really matters is not how many clicks it takes for the user to reach the desired outcome, but rather how ‘hard’ each click is i.e. the amount of thought required and the amount of uncertainty about whether the user is making the right choice. Keeping this in mind, after initially designing a separate page for the pricing list, I decided to put the pricing page on the extended home page. This will allow the users to navigate to the pricing section without much effort or uncertainty involved. This will give users continued confidence that they are on the right track and move forward with the navigation.
I created different logos for HiDubai Reach. Our initial idea was to give HiDubai Reach a separate logo as we believed it would be useful for the product to have its own identity. However, after interacting with a few of the clients and customers, they kept confusing Reach for a wholly separate product altogether rather than a subsidiary of the HiDubai platform. This would take away from the brand value of HiDubai as a singular entity and works against the high-level goals of the company. While this meant a few hours of design work down the drain, it also highlighted the importance of user feedback during the design process and how it trumps individual ideas in the context of the company’s success.
The Final Product
Develop
HiDubai Reach is live now!
Check out the website here
Future for HiDubai Reach
Monitoring the numbers through applicable metrics would help create a feedback process which would be a long-term solution. I would like to conduct a follow-up website analytics process to check on the users’ interactions with the website. Furthermore, I would like to use Hotjar to collect click heatmap data and also analyze some of the recordings to further scrutinize the user behavior.
Takeaways
Reflection
Collaboration – I had the opportunity to collaborate with the director of operations, project manager, and developers. This helped me understand the importance of collaboration, how important it is to be well organized and well planned, and how to present my data and design in a visual format.
Failure is a stepping stone – I realized my knowledge gaps during the project were just that – gaps that are meant to be filled through feedback, research, and help from your peers. Be it about the UI or collaboration skills, I learned a lot and I will try to maintain the same attitude for all of my endeavors in the future
